Marvin's Quest
by Martin Baker
Summary: When Marvin is left behind to park cars, his chance meeting with a mysterious young android girl thrusts him in to an interplanetary adventure and a raceagainst time.
1. Chapter 1

Disclaimer:

All characters and situations belonging to The HitchHiker's Guide to the Galaxy are the sole property of Douglas Adams. I own only the characters that sprung from my own mind.

Author's Note:

This was originally supposed to be a oneshot. The chapter title was supposed to be the title of the fic, but then things got out of hand. To my lovely love, Mary, hurrumph in advance for the bad review you were planning to give me! I know you're not crazy about HitchHiker's, but you'd be surprised how little HitchHiker's has to do with this story. I just sort of grabbed poor Marvin and put him in a world of my own creation. MARY SUES ABOUND! A great big squishy apology goes to anyone who finds this offensive.

Chapter One:

They Left Me

They left me. I knew they would sometime, but I always thought their leaving would result in my destruction. I would not have complained if they left me in a junkyard or alone on some dreary ship headed for some equally dismal sun, but this? Parking cars like some menial service robot is hardly my idea of a somewhat tolerable experience. Come to think of it, my entire existence somehow fails to be even remotely bearable.

Oh look. Here comes a car. I hate cars. This one is blue, painted everywhere with moons, stars, and planets. The well-muscled male humanoid opening the driver's side door looks to be in his mid twenties to early thirties with what appear to be gills behind his ears and long hair. He keeps it in a thick, four-stranded braid tied at the end with a leather band. The braid is so long that for a microsecond, I wonder if the man has ever thought of hanging himself with it. No. I can see by the skull-splitting smile on his face as he opens the passenger side door that monotony and hopelessness are the farthest things from his mind.

A petite female creature steps from the vehicle, and the man locks her door, closing it gently. The female has long hair like her counterpart, but it is covered by a long vale of lace worked with tiny shells. A pair of great wings rests one to either side of her delicate frame, bright red feathers lying against the white lace of the wedding dress she wears. The ring on her hand, glinting in the car's headlights, is another shell, encrusted with tiny crystals that change colors in the light. The stomach area of her dress is made of a stretchy satin-like material. It is rippling now is if something is pushing it from the inside.

"Look, Septimus," she says softly, taking his hand and laying it on her moving stomach.

"He's awake," he says with a smile most would classify as beatific. "Do you think he is as happy as we are, Maya Celestina?"

"Ah, my Septimus," she breathes "I know he is! His father and mother are wedded for eternity now, and nothing can ever change that."

Eternity. How humans find such pleasure in the concept of endless time, I'll never know. They kiss, another thing I cannot or perhaps will not comprehend. The kiss, a gesture performed by two or more life forms that utilizes the suction capability of their lips seems a poor way to express one's affection, if affection is a thing as grand as they say. Being a bored, gloomy, and clinically depressed robot, I wouldn't know. Nobody has ever gone out of his or her way to administer things like affection, and seeing nothing enjoyable about it, I have never pursued it.

"Here you are, robot!" the male says when the kiss is ended. "Catch!" He throws me the keys to his vehicle and turns, sweeping the female in to his arms and striding quickly away.

"No more robots, Septimus," she says with a laugh. "That parking robot will be the last we ever see in this life. You will like that, won't you?"

"Maya Celestina, I will love that!" he says fervently. "Living on my planet, you will see that there is no need for robots and computers. The air is cleaner, the water is clearer, and our children can run and play anywhere, for everywhere is safe."

They are gone at last, though I can still hear their voices with my enhanced hearing. What's the point? I feel no fascination for the two strange beings, though I know most any other being in the universe, had it been watching them, would be left with so many unanswered questions. Looking at the vehicle before me, I know that now I must park it. The surface seems to undulate, shifting the painted skyscape a little at a time. Opening the driver's side door, I settle into the leather seat and shut it again. The interior smells of rose and pine. A few feathers lay on the carpet of the passenger's side. With as much enthusiasm as I have for everything, which is none at all, I start the car. The engine is almost completely silent.

I steer the vehicle in to a parking space before bringing it to a stop. Hmmm. That's odd. Something is stirring in the trunk. What could it be? I've heard of these humanoids leaving their pets in the trunk by accident. The robots that found them and brought them back to their masters were always thanked profusely and paid for their trouble. Though I have no interest in gratitude or money, I suppose I'd better get the pet out of the trunk and bring it to the newly married beings. They will come pestering me for it if I don't, and it will be a change, however unpleasant, from the monotonous job of parking cars. I push the lever that opens the trunk with my foot, but the trunk lid does not open.

"Mamma?" a sleepy voice asks from inside the trunk. "Papa? Where are you?"

The voice is so small, so young sounding, and I don't know what to make of it. There is a current of electricity running through it, making me think it is not entirely humanoid. Nothing humanoid can talk when it is run through by electric currents.

"Mamma?" it asks again. "Is it time for you and Papa to be wedded yet? I can't wait to be the flower girl in my new dress."

Yes, there is a definite crackle of electricity. What is this young being in the trunk, and why can I not open the lid? Why does she not know that the owners of the vehicle were already married, especially if she was meant to take part in the ceremony? Pulling the keys from the ignition, I exit the vehicle and walk to the trunk's keyhole. I try first one key, and then another. No luck. Another key, and still nothing.

"Papa?" the voice asks a third time. "Is this a game? Are we playing hide and seek? I can't get out. Silly Papa, won't you let me out?"

None of the keys will work. Seeing a wire laying on the ground nearby, I pick it up, sliding it into the keyhole.

"Mamma," the voice says, softer now "I need more power. I've been in here so long, Mamma, and I'm running out of electricity."

The wire is stuck. With some difficulty, I pull it free. It is covered with a strange gluey substance, as though it was ceiled shut from the inside. Experimentally, I poke the wire's opposite end along the groove between the trunk's lid and bottom. When I pull it away, it too is covered with the same glue. For some inexplicable reason, the car's owners wanted the small being to remain trapped within the trunk. With a flash of realization, I remember what the female said as the male carried her away. No more robots. It seems that they possessed a child robot, but when the female became pregnant, they had no further need of it. Why, then, did they wait so long to rid themselves of it? By looking at the woman, I could tell she was very far along indeed.

"Papa?" If robots could be said to whisper, this one would. "I know I've been bad. I'm sorry for spilling milk on your favorite tie this morning. I'm sorry for making you late to the wedding. I'll be so much better. Just let me out! Please?"

I feel so powerless. There is nothing I can do, nothing at all. I didn't think it was possible, but I feel more depressed now than I did before. There is a robot in there, a robot who thinks herself part of a family who has no more regard for her than my former shipmates had for me. At least I never thought of them as family. At least I never made the mistake of caring, -- well, almost never. If I cared at all, it wasn't enough to be noted, so we will keep it out of this running narrative.

"Hello?" the voice asks. "Anyone? I know someone is there. Who are you? Where are Mamma and Papa?"

"Hello," I respond. "My name is Marvin. Your humanoids have gone away."

"What's a humanoid?" she asks.

"Well, it's an organic being that walks on two legs, thinks of its self as very important and gives orders to robots like me."

"You're a robot?" she asks. "My name is Maria. Papa says I'm a robot too, so I guess we're related."

"I see," I say gravely, not knowing how in the world one talks to a child. "Well, your Papa is a humanoid, your Mamma is a humanoid, and your humanoids have gone away."

"Are they never coming back, Uncle Marvin?" she asks.

"Never," I confirm. "They got married, and I was the robot who parked their ghastly car. That's how I heard you in the trunk."

"Oh," she says with a sigh. "Will you let me out, Uncle Marvin? I need to recharge."

"I'm sorry, Maria," I tell her "but I can't. I'm afraid they've ceiled you in good and tight. There's gelatinous glue all along the edge of the trunk and in the lock."

"So I can never get out?" she asks.

"I don't know," I tell her. "I have no idea how to break the ceil.

"Maybe if you activate Mamma's emergency alarm, someone will come," she suggests hopefully.

"Emergency alarm?" I ask.

"It's the big square red button on the right of the steering wheel," she says, her voice trembling slightly. "Hurry, Uncle Marvin. I'm counting on you."

No pressure. Opening the driver's side door, I once again enter the vehicle. There, just as she said it would be, is the large red emergency button.

"Bing bong!" A bell rings from a speaker above me. "Emergency dispatch. This is Maya Jean," a crisp female voice says. "Please state the nature of your emergency."

"The trunk of this car is ceiled shut," I say.

"Define ceiled, please," the voice says.

"Define ceiled?" I ask. "Ceiled, woman! Ceiled! Closed! Shut! Clamped up tight!"

"Please remain calm, sir," the voice says. "What is the trunk ceiled with?"

"The trunk is ceiled with a gelatinous substance," I answer in a calmer tone.

"Gelatinous substance," the voice drones. "Sir, I'm afraid you'll have to be more specific."

"It is green and white," I say. "Does that help? It has little grains of something in it, making it rough in texture."

"Thank you," the voice says. "We will send a team out immediately, but it may take some time, as it seems you are on another planet."

"How long will it be?" I ask.

"Sir," the voice says in measured tones "please be patient. Your call is very important to us, but there are others waiting ahead of you."

"You don't understand," I say. "This is far more important."

"Your trunk is closed. It isn't a life or death situation, you know. You must be a Beeblebrox," the voice says dryly. "Hold, sir."

A loud click terminates my connection with the interplanetary emergency service. With a sigh, I exit the vehicle and go to stand beside the trunk where Maria, the child robot is imprisoned. "They're coming," I tell her.

"Thank you, Uncle Marvin!" she says. "I knew you could do it."

"It doesn't take me long to get nothing done," I say. "I have a brain the size of a planet, you know."

"But Uncle Marvin," she laughs, a bubbling laugh that any other being would find infectious "some planets are really really small. Did you know that?"

"I must say," I tell her warmly "nobody has ever given me that response before."

"Mamma says – said, I'm unpredictable," she tells me.

"That you are," I say. "That you are. Any other child, any other robot would be banging the walls of such a small enclosure and screaming themselves raw."

"Why?" she asks. "I would bang and scream if I thought I could get out that way, but I can't. Don't you see?"

"I see," I say solemnly. "How long have you been in there, little one?"

"I don't know," she says "but it was morning when Mamma told me to look for a surprise in the trunk and Papa said he'd let me ride to the church in it just for fun."

"There was nothing in the trunk, was there?" I ask.

"No," she says "just a note that says 'Sorry, darling. Love Mamma and Papa.'"

"I don't think they were sorry at all," I tell her.

"I think they were sorry, Uncle Marvin," she says "but not sorry enough."

There is a long lapse of silence, leaving plenty of time for the feeling of utter powerlessness to consume me. I wonder how Maria must be feeling trapped inside the trunk with her energy source slowly depleting. Unbidden, an image of that ape descendant Arthur Dent comes to mind.

"I wish it would rain," she says in to the quiet. I love rain. Don't you, Uncle Marvin?"

"It rained a lot on earth," I tell her.

"Earth?" she asks. "Tell me about it, won't you?"

"Once there was a world called earth," I say, by way of introduction. "Earth was a beautiful place with deep blue seas and wide blue skies. There were mountains where snow fell soft and white. There were valleys where trees grew green and strong."

"What is snow?" she asked, the crackle of electricity more apparent in her voice.

"Snow," I say, thinking quickly of all that Arthur had told me when I had been less than interested "is magical water that falls and sticks together like dough. It is cold, and you can pick it up with your hands if you've a mind to. On earth, people made balls of the stuff and threw them at each other for fun."

"Did it hurt?" she asks.

"Oh no," I say, doing my best to mask my rising concern for her. "Snow was so soft that it didn't hurt a bit. People also liked to make snowmen with it. These were not altogether humanoid. They were made of three balls, a small one for the head, followed by a medium ball and a large ball."

"They sound silly," she says with a laugh.

"Oh, they were," I assure. "Lots of things about earth were silly. There were many imperfections with the planet its self and the people living on it, but for the most part, it was a good and happy place."

"Were the people all beautiful on earth like they are on Mamma and Papa's planets?" she asks. I am beginning to have difficulty understanding her due to the amount of electricity running through her weakening voice.

"No, my dear," I tell her. "The people on earth were not all beautiful, at least not according to the galaxy's standard of beauty. Some were old and some were fat. Some were bony and some had warts, but all, no matter how ugly or decrepit, had at least one person who saw them fully and thought them beautiful. Because of this, they all lived happily ever after."

So much of this is a lie, and though I know it, I can do nothing else but lie to her. Trapped in a seemingly hopeless situation, this child needs something of beauty to which she can hold fast, and I, in my own depressing way, am trying to make sure this need is met.

"Maybe I will go there," she says dreamily.

"Go there?" I repeat stupidly.

"Definitely a small planet, Uncle Marvin," she says fondly. "I'm dying. I can feel my circuits burning."

"I did not give you permission to die," I say firmly. "The emergency team will be here soon. Then we can get you out of that little box, and if you want to, we can go adventuring and see the whole universe."

"I'd like that," she whispers painfully "but oh Uncle Marvin, it hurts so much!"

"I'm sorry," I say softly. "If only I could take your place."

"Everything happens for a reason," she whispers. "Remember that, won't you? There are no accidents."

"I will miss you," I tell her.

"I won't miss you, Uncle Marvin," she whispers. "How can I when I'm always with you?"

A loud pop comes from inside the trunk, followed by the sound of burning wires. Maria is gone, and though I knew her only briefly, I can feel the loss of her innocent vibrance like a lance through my inner workings. As if on cue, a gentle rain begins to fall. I lose my balance, colliding with the vehicle, leaning heavily against the softly undulating metal for support. If I could cry, I would, but that is a luxury that The Serious Cybernetics Corporation, in their infinite lack of wisdom, decided not to afford me. I have only this yawning emptiness within and the feeling that gravity is pressing in on me from all angles from without.

Off in the distance, a large spacecraft dots the sky, shining like an undulating blue star. The emergency team has arrived at last. As I watch the ship begin its dive, my hollow disinterest mutates in to a tight coil of molten rage. The ship touches ground, and I notice through the red haze currently clouding my judgment that it is as silent as the car had been when I parked it. A side panel slides silently back, and a small flight of steps descends to touch the ground.

Down the steps come four humanoids, bristling with weapons. They are so completely covered with armor that I cannot determine their genders. Like the ship and the car, their unnaturally large armor is blue and painted all over with moons, stars, and planets that undulate. When the raindrops hit it, the metal ripples as though it too were made of water. Their gates are so measured, so self-assured, and I hate them. I hate the slow precision and seemingly calm exteriors they are bringing to this situation. I hate the fact that while Maria was dying, other people with trifling emergencies were receiving the services of the emergency dispatch team because of some incompetent woman who calls herself Maya Jean.

I grab the first humanoid and shake it. "SHE'S GONE!" I scream at it. "YOU'RE TOO LATE!"

Two of the humanoids haul me off their comrade while the fourth walks to the trunk with a strange yellow flashlight-looking object.

"It's going to be all right, sir," the humanoid on my left says in an authoritative yet somewhat understanding female voice.

"Violence isn't going to help your friend," the humanoid on my right says in the same voice.

"YOU'RE TOO LATE! YOU'RE TOO LATE!" I scream at each of them in turn.

The first female humanoid walks over to help the fourth with the trunk, and together, they use their flashlights to dissolve the ceil. I break free of the two females holding me to stand behind the two opening the trunk. Moonlight falls on Maria's young face, and I stare, stricken. She looks to be no more than ten years old. Her long dark hair is loose, spread fan-like about her where she lays. Her brown eyes are open and staring. Clouds of steam still rise from a gaping hole in her chest. Wires poke through the fabric of the red dress she wears, the dress she was looking forward to wearing at the wedding of her supposed parents. Her lips, full and round as a small rose, are drawn in to a soft smile. For a microsecond, I wonder what she could have been thinking in those last moments, but now I know. She was thinking of earth and her belief that nothing happens by accident.

"You're too late," I say ever so softly, reaching past the two female emergency workers to lift Maria's broken body from the trunk. She is so light, as though she were hollow inside. I wonder miserably if perhaps she is. How much circuitry burned away before the flames extinguished her spirit?

The rain falls harder, forming beads of clear water on her dark hair. "Here is the rain you wanted, little one," I tell her, looking in to the lifeless face as I cradle the body close. "You wished it would rain. Remember?"

"Maya FireFall, Maya Blade, Maya Lauren," the first female softly addresses her comrades "I think this is a job for Maya Anika, don't you?"

"I couldn't agree more, Maya Melani," the one called Maya FireFall replies. The other two nod before ascending the undulating steps of their ship.

Nothing they do can be of any help now. Let the strange Maya creatures swarm about me. They are all too late. Too late. Too late.

"Marvin?" a soft female voice says behind me.

"How do you know my name?" I ask accusingly, turning abruptly to face this newest interrupter of my solitary despair.

The winged female behind me looks at once very young and very old. Her silver hair falls in waves down her back, and her large wings are red as Maria's mother's had been. Her wide dark eyes hold my gaze in a way I find highly unsettling and oddly comforting.

"Marvin, dear," she says, "I can read your mind. I'm afraid it's a gift. If you come with me, there is a very good chance I can do something to fix your poor little friend. Neglect of any thinking being, including robots, is a very serious offence on my planet. If you come with me, we can find Septimus and bring him to justice."

"And what about his precious Maya Celestina?" I ask bitterly. "If you think she is blameless, you are stupider than you appear."

"I do not know what part Maya Celestina played in this tragic misdeed, but I intend to find out. If she is indeed at fault, then she too will be brought to justice. I give you my solemn promise."

I can tell this Maya Anika is doubtful of Maya Celestina's guilt, but if she will lead me to her, then I will go. I will go and exact my vengeance on both of them, and if Maria can indeed be repaired, she can help me. I highly doubt there is any help for Maria, however. The protruding wires are frayed on the ends, so there will be no mending them.

"Won't you come, Marvin?" she asks again.

"I will come," I say formally, following Maya Anika up the steps of the ship as the rain falls in torrents, taking the place of my unshed tears.


	2. Maya Anica's Tale

I follow Maya Anika up the undulating steps of the ship, carrying in my arms Maria's lifeless form and hoping dully that this journey won't prove to be another ghastly mistake. This is something I must do, and though I still feel knives of scorching rage stabbing my inner workings, I have never been a robot of action. I have never been the first one to do anything due to my failure to see the point of trying. Now that I am forced in to action by anger, despair, and another feeling I can't find the word for, I am faced with the looming shadow of fear.

Though depression has always been my primary emotion, I know fear. Fear was when I would walk away from my shipmates, afraid noone would follow me. They didn't. Fear was wondering if I shut down in some secluded place if anyone would wonder where I was. I tried it once. I was hidden in a storage closet for three days, and nobody came looking for me. The most I got when I came back was, "Oh! Marvin! There you are. Knew you'd turn up sooner or later." How depressing. Fear was wondering whenever the ship stopped if I would be left behind. I was.

Now, fear is back, and though I am doing my best to ignore it, this anger is giving it room to take root in my massive brain. There are disadvantages to being equipped with a brain the size of a planet. While math comes easy to me, so does the ability to imagine five million of the worst possible outcomes for any given situation. I am doing this now, standing just beyond the steps and looking gloomily around the ship's spacious interior.

The inner walls are made of the same undulating metal as the ship's exterior. A long polished counter lines the wall to my left. In the far corner is a narrow wooden door. Its knob is a small, hand-crafted glass rose. I notice now that every knob in the ship is worked in the same design. To my right stretch rows and rows of what appear to be large, over-stuffed chairs.

"Here we are," Maya Anica says as though I do not already know it. "Welcome, Marvin, to the starship Glory!"

I feel sure Maria would have loved this luxurious ship with all its handcrafted finery. Though every detail exudes perfection, there Is a certain unpredictability in it all that can only exist in work done by non-robotic beings. The long counter looks to have been carved by hand, and no painted astral body orbiting the metal walls is the exact copy of another.

"This is not one of our usual emergency dispatch ships," Maya Anica says by way of explanation, settling herself gracefully in one of the chairs and following my gaze. "There were no ships available, but I had a premonition your call was of the utmost urgency." Her sorrowful eyes run over Maria's lifeless face like a caress. "It seems I was right."

"If your premonition was so important to you," I say accusingly "why were you so long in coming?"

"A fair question," comes Maya Anica's gentle reply. I am unused to being spoken to in this fashion, and it angers me. "You see Marvin, long ago, our home planet of Xepsinia was ruled by the Keldreks. The Keldreks saw Mayas as a race inferior to themselves, and so they kept us as slaves to tend their houses and build their pyramids."

"A very sad tale," I say by way of response. I know no response is required, but I hope my complete and utter disinterest in her little story will encourage Maya Anica to get to the bloody point. "Now what does it have to do with the delayed arrival of your accursed ship?"

"Sit down, Marvin," Maya Anica says with a tolerant smile. "I will get to that presently." Maya Anica lifts one slender hand and a glass cupboard behind the counter opens. I sit in the chair opposite her, watching a teapot, a teabag, and cup float from the cupboard, bumping it closed behind themselves. "Now, some years ago, Maya Dennea began the great revolution. She is one of the most prominent figures in Xepsinian history, but I will spare you the details. To make a long story short, armies were formed, a war was fought, and the Mayas claimed ownership of Xepsinia, sending the Keldreks in a fully furnished ship to make a life for themselves somewhere else."

Bored, I watch the pot fill itself with water from a pump also located behind the counter before laboriously hopping on to a small wood stove and beginning to boil. The teabag takes a quite literal flying leap into the water, causing the surface to ripple. If I were not drowning in a sea of Sinicism and despair, this spectical might be slightly entertaining, but as it is, I think Maya Anica is showing off in some washed out attempt to impress me with her power. It is not working.

"Nonsense, Marvin!" She laughs musically, tilting her head quizzically to look at me. "Ah well. You are not the first being to accuse a Maya of showing off, and you won't be the last. In all honesty, I am perfectly capable of making tea, but doing it with my mind is so much easier in a pinch. It's been a long day, you know."

I look down at the unmoving form lying across my lap and wonder how this winged humanoid sitting in a luxurious ship can tell me this day has been remotely long. Today, for the first time in my unnaturally long existence, I had the chance to be truly needed. Oh, people have always asked me to perform one task or another, but these were all things they could have done for themselves. "Marvin, take them to the bridge." "Marvin, pick up that piece of paper, will you? There's a good chap." "Marvin, can you pilot this ship?" "Marvin, do those dishes, won't you?"

"Marvin, I need you to guard the entrance of the cave. Make sure Arthur doesn't get into too much trouble, please? Thanks." "I've got to run. Marvin, won't you look after my white mice for me?" And my favorite of all time, "Marvin, we've got to go for a little while. Wait here till we get back?" Everything they asked of me was something they could have done for themselves, but Maria was innocent, a helpless traveler in this vast universe. It would have been an honor to help her in any way I could. Through my pointless existence, I've always felt I was meant for so much more than the life of a menial robot, and with that beautiful child as a companion, I could have held my conviction with certainty.

"Marvin, do you think Maria was the first child in this universe to die as a result of incompetent and neglectful guardians? Do you think nobody who ever lived cared for a child as you care for her?" Maya Anica's gentle face takes on an expression of mingled pity and impatience. "I can indeed say this day has been a long one for me, as all days are. My team and I see countless precious children of all species in similar emergencies to that of little Maria. We find them dead, we find them mortally injured but slow to die, and we find them so mentally scarred and warped by the abuse of the ones whose vocation it is to nurture and teach them that we are forced to kill them."

"Perhaps," I say with impatience of my own "if you did not feel so free to browse the contents of my mind, you wouldn't be so easily offended by my thoughts. The ability to do a thing doesn't always give you the right."

"Thank you," Maya Anica says to the teapot as it pours boiling tea in to its waiting cup. "Marvin dear, I can understand why you feel violated by my seeing your thoughts, but you must understand I can hear your thoughts as plainly as though you are speaking them aloud. With others like myself, I avoid answering their personal thoughts by looking to see if their lips move when they speak. If they say something with no mouth movement, I surmise that it must be a thought. Because you were not made with human facial features…"

"I understand, woman!" I cut her off. "Now, will you please continue with the pathetic history of your insignificant planet?"

This creature is, next to Trillian, the most infuriating female I have ever met! I vow from now on to voice my every thought, no matter how callous and unfeeling it may be. I am, after all, a machine. Let the humanoids feel and care. Let their hearts bleed and their minds melt under forces such as rage or love. For my part, I will sit idally by, ticking by every pointless second, tick, tick, tick, and rusting little by little, I will wait for the galaxy to implode, collapsing in on itself in a shower of cosmic dust.

"Right then." The spoon floating toward Maya Anica clinks a bit too loudly into the cup, causing the contence to slosh dangerously. "Now, let's return to the history of my so-called insignificant planet, shall we?" A rose-shaped dish of brightly-rapped sugar cubes nudges her hand. Patting it, she takes two of the cubes, opening them, and stirring them into her tea. "Where was I?"

"After you, the Mayas, won a war with them, the enslaving Keldreks, you sent your enemies off in a fully furnished ship to go with they would instead of properly disposing of them as any other race with half an ounce of common sense would have done," I tell her helpfully.

"Oh yes," she says briskly. My sarcasm is lost on her. "Well, after the Keldreks fled from the scene of their epic defeat, they traveled in space for many months."

"And you used your psychic mind-probing powers to know presicely how long they traveled, I presume," I remark, wasting yet another precious drop of my limitless sarcasm.

"No, dear." Her voice is patient, showing only a hint of annoyance around the edges. "Later, one of the Keldreks returned to Xepsinia, and has been working as an informant ever since. He told us all he knows of the Keldreks, their departure from our world, and all that transpired afterword. Now, may I continue?" I nod.

"So, after leaving Xepsinia, the Keldreks traveled for many months," she repeats. The look she casts my way is intent, doubtless, an attempt to figuratively brush the stray bangs of cinisism from my eyes. "Food, water, and patience were running short among the ship's two thousand members, and small wars were breaking out among the ranks." She sighs, studying a dot on the ceiling only she can see. "One day," she continues "when life aboard the ship was looking particularly hopeless, something peculiar happened. A song began eminating out of the ships ceiling, walls, and floor. It was, as songs go, not the most beautiful melody ever written. The voice, though young and sweet in its way, quavered just noticeably, and the instrument, sounding like an out of tune piano mixed with some strain of flute, often fumbled between chords, giving the song a hap-hazard ere. Nevertheless, the Keldreks were astounded at such beauty. The captain's eyes glazed over, and he drove the ship jerkily as though he were a marrienette."

Her hand tightens around the handle of her tea cup, and it squeaks in protest. She pats it absently with a murmured apology. Rolling the strange story around and around my massive brain, I am reminded of the tales Arthur Dent would tell of his planet's mythology. There were on Earth, or so the legend goes, lovely women who lived in the oceans and luered sailors to their deaths. When a waterbound wooden ship would sail by, the cyrens, as these creatures were called, would sing, enticing the men aboard the ship to follow them. So mesmerized were they that often they would follow the cyrens to their deaths, dashing their ships against sharp rocks. When these sea-bound ships hit the rocks, holes would be punctured in their primative wooden shells. Through the holes, cold dark water would come, pulling the ship ever downward and causing its occupants to drown.

A smile breaks across Maya Anica's face, and she nods. "Very good, Marvin! That is exactly what happened to the Keldreks. Dazed and transfixed, the Keldreks watched their captain drive the ship that had become for them both home and prison straight into the side of a small planet. Beautiful creatures our informant later learned were called Omegas ran to help dislodge the ship imbedded in the lush soil of their planet. With time, and the help of many larger ships that were fashioned to look like blue dolphins, the Keldreks' ship was freed. Many died in the collision, and Omegas helped the remaining survivers to burry their dead. The Omegas also provided the newcomers with food, shelter, and, most important of all, friendship."

The empty cup sails back behind the counter to refill its self, returning to its mistress with the sugar bowl and spoon in toe. With two more cubes bobbing in her tea, Maya Anica is again stirring thoughtfully, looking down at the mixture as though it has the power to help her escape the sadness etched on her lovely face. "With their numbers significantly depleted and an acute depression brought on by the lack of sunlight during their long journey, the Keldreks were vulnerable, seeing the Omegas as their saviors, as a superior race worthy of life-long servitude. Never mind the fact that it was Amathysta, the Omegan queen, who caused the fatal crash. The Keldreks pledged themselves in service, binding their race indefinitely to the Omegas. And so it was that as the Keldreks enslaved the Mayas, they too were enslaved. The difference was, while the Keldreks controlled our bodies, the Omegas control their souls."

"A sad story," I say after what seems an appropriate length of silence. "But I still fail to see what all this has to do with why you and your lovely lackies were so long in coming, nor do I understand why you brought a luxury ship."

"This is no luxury ship, Marvin." She laughs, looking about her with the fondness of one used to traveling. "This is a standard Mayan spacecraft, used for expeditions and such. We would have come in one of our emergency ships, but they are all out either in service to those in need or in battle."

She sighs, patting a large fur throw rug that is winding about her ankles in a very cat-like fashion. The thing is white, possessing the head, paws and tail of what once must have been something akin to a lion. Its round eyes of clearest jade roll up to look at Maya Anica in what I can only classify as concern.

"You see, Marvin," she says softly, seeming to talk more to herself than to me "my sisters and I are at war with the Omegas and have been for the last six years. The Keldreks are not the only race taken as servants by the Omegas. It is Queen Amathysta's wish that the Omegas possess the virtues of all other races. She believes that by breeding her subjects with the offworlders captured through violence, hypnotism, and other means of persuasion, the Omegas will evolve into a super-race, a group of beings capable of ruling all life that is, was, or ever will be."

"Such a feat would be impossible," I tell her, stating the obvious. "Throughout history, all other attempts at creating a superior race have ended in the birth of a poorly-evolved group of idiots good only for amusement, bate, menial jobs, or scientific experiments."

"While that is true, Marvin," Maya Anica says gravely "you have not yet seen the Omegas. They have gills that they might swim to depths untold. They can sing like the birds and heal from great injuries with the speed of any lecanthrop. They have mastered the arts of pain and pleasure, resourcefulness and persuasion, but the worst thing of all is…" She pauses, shutting her eyes for a moment as though this simple jesture could make this last untrue. "The Omegas, like the dragons, can live for a thousand years and breed for all of those."

I have to admit, I am slightly impressed. "Why then," I ask "do the all-powerful Omegas want to war with you?"

The Mayas have three gifts no Omega has been able to master," she says solemnly. "The gift of flight, the ability to travel through time, and the ability to stay at any age they choose."

If I could raise one eyebrow in a quizzical expression, I would. "Any age? I ask. "Does this make the Mayas immortal?"

"Contrary to popular belief, it does not." She sighs. "We, the Mayas, are given five hundred years to do with as we please. If one wishes, she may spend her entire life as a newborn, being kissed and cuddled by all. Or, if one's intellect grows beyond the span of her body, she may decide to grow from ten to twenty in a blink. Mayas may stay as old as they wish for as long as they wish in the time allotted them, but once a Maya goes forward, there is no going back."

"I can see why the talents you possess would prove desirable to such a power-hungry race as the Omegas," I say after a pause "but how will war help to obtain them?"

"Ah Marvin." Maya Anica sighs, a tired sigh full of age and worry. "Marvin, it would not, but on Aironea, the world of the Omegas, ten of our sisters, for we are all sisters, are being held prisoner. Also, the Omegan men grow bolder and are beginning to talk some of our young and innocent sisters into consentual marriages. They write to us, but no matter how unhappy they are, their husbands do not permit them to make the journey to visit their home. We must find them, dear one, and, no matter what the cost, bring them back with us."


End file.
